Post by bullhornbob on Dec 4, 2008 0:59:44 GMT -5
SOAPA Conference – Kennesaw State University – UGA Football
We arrived in Marietta, Georgia on Tuesday night for the annual SOAPA Conference and joined the early arrivals for dinner. I always look forward to these conferences as a great time of fellowship and of course, the preaching is top notch. I appreciate Brother **** Christensen for managing and directing these meetings. This year’s theme was “The Wrath Of Almighty God!” How’s that for a conference theme?!
Wednesday, October 15, 2008:
Our arrival at Shallowford Freewill Baptist Church coincided with about 25-30 other street/campus preachers, and Brother Jim Gilles opened the Conference with a very informative message on open-air preaching essentials. We all split up into 2 teams and headed out to campus at 10:30AM.
Our group went to Kennesaw State University, and consisted of 10 preachers. I was privileged to start off the preaching, and it took about 20 minutes before I was able to gain a considerable crowd of about 50 students. I had a few that immediately started opposing and heckling, and after 45 minutes, the crowd was up to about 150, and I turned it over to Brother ****.
It was a very productive time of preaching, complete with interruptions by police and lots and lots of hecklers. The preachers all took a turn, including Evangelista. She was able to preach for a short time, but it was so loud and rowdy that it was hard to do anything except preach straight scripture. I also had another short time of preaching, and since our permit was only until 3:00PM, we packed up and headed out for the day.
We all met back at the church for the evening service after dinner for more preaching and fellowship. Pastor Len Blanchard, Brother Jesse Morrell, and Pastor David Gibson all shared great messages centering on the theme of the conference. We headed back to our hotel room at around 10:00PM.
Thursday, October 16, 2008:
After a brief meeting at the church, we were able to go back to KSU again with another group of preachers today. I loaded up the pulpit in my pickup and headed over to the free speech area to meet the rest of the team. It was chaos among the students from the very beginning, and throughout the afternoon we had crowds of 25-150, screaming their anti-christian, intolerant, unloving venom at the preachers continuously.
Most of the preachers had a chance to preach, with some even being threatened with arrest for supposedly singling out students or using “fighting words.” I am amazed at what lengths these students will go to in trying to shut down the preaching. At one point a student/youth pastor showed up and drew most of the crowd away to hear his antinomian, neo-evangelical mishmash of a message. The crowd eventually became so vile that a police Sgt. hailed the crowd with his patrol car loudspeaker and announced “No more profanity out here! I will arrest you if I hear you cussing!” Now that was a pleasant surprise.
Again, our permit ended at 3:00PM, and we all headed out for a short break until the evening service started. We attended the meeting and were challenged by some superb preaching again. After some fellowship with a small group afterwards, we headed back to our room at about 11PM.
Friday, October 17, 2008:
Today’s schedule was filled with preachers throughout the day, and I was privileged to share from Ecclesiastes 12:13-14 after lunch. The title of my message was “Who’s afraid of God anymore? I shared for about 45 minutes, and I believe that it was well received. I enjoyed the other speakers’ messages as well, which is why I try and attend these conferences every year.
We were scheduled to preach a rock concert after dinner, but cancelled due to inclement weather. Our evening ended after dinner with a few of the folks, as we were expecting a long day in Athens tomorrow.
Saturday, October 18, 2008:
We checked out of our room and met up with the team early today to make the long drive to Athens. We also dropped off our vehicle along the way to avoid going back into Marietta at the end of the day, which would also make our trip back to McDonough much shorter.
After arriving in Athens, we drove around a bit to find adequate parking, and then walked to the stadium. Evangelista and I were teamed up with Bro. Cope and Bro. Virgil, and as soon as we got to the pedestrian walkway outside of the stadium, I lifted my banner and began preaching to the huge crowds. There were tens of thousands of people here today, and within a couple of hours, they would all be inside the stadium cheering for their beloved bulldogs.
As the crowds began to thin, we positioned ourselves by the ticket gate, and we all had a turn or two preaching. Evangelista had a young man approach her weeping and bawling and howling “you’re pushing people away, you’re turning people off, please, please, STOP PREACHING!” I have never seen a man cry over the preaching. Girls, yes. But a guy, never! We eventually moved over to the open end of the stadium and faced the huge +70,000 crowd with our banners lifted high.
Our intention was to meet up for lunch, and then hit the crowds leaving the game before we headed back to the Atlanta area, but we had some logistical issues, and our team actually wound up at the wrong restaurant. Regardless, we had a superb time of fellowship, and then headed back to our truck to be dropped of by our good friend Bro. Cope.
Our drive back the RV was a bit long, and we were pretty tired by the time we arrived in McDonough. We spent some time with our very gracious hosts, and then called it a night in order to get some rest.
PLEASE PRAY FOR US AS WE PREACH THE GOSPEL PUBLICLY ON CAMPUSES AND STREETCORNERS EVERYWHERE!
We arrived in Marietta, Georgia on Tuesday night for the annual SOAPA Conference and joined the early arrivals for dinner. I always look forward to these conferences as a great time of fellowship and of course, the preaching is top notch. I appreciate Brother **** Christensen for managing and directing these meetings. This year’s theme was “The Wrath Of Almighty God!” How’s that for a conference theme?!
Wednesday, October 15, 2008:
Our arrival at Shallowford Freewill Baptist Church coincided with about 25-30 other street/campus preachers, and Brother Jim Gilles opened the Conference with a very informative message on open-air preaching essentials. We all split up into 2 teams and headed out to campus at 10:30AM.
Our group went to Kennesaw State University, and consisted of 10 preachers. I was privileged to start off the preaching, and it took about 20 minutes before I was able to gain a considerable crowd of about 50 students. I had a few that immediately started opposing and heckling, and after 45 minutes, the crowd was up to about 150, and I turned it over to Brother ****.
It was a very productive time of preaching, complete with interruptions by police and lots and lots of hecklers. The preachers all took a turn, including Evangelista. She was able to preach for a short time, but it was so loud and rowdy that it was hard to do anything except preach straight scripture. I also had another short time of preaching, and since our permit was only until 3:00PM, we packed up and headed out for the day.
We all met back at the church for the evening service after dinner for more preaching and fellowship. Pastor Len Blanchard, Brother Jesse Morrell, and Pastor David Gibson all shared great messages centering on the theme of the conference. We headed back to our hotel room at around 10:00PM.
Thursday, October 16, 2008:
After a brief meeting at the church, we were able to go back to KSU again with another group of preachers today. I loaded up the pulpit in my pickup and headed over to the free speech area to meet the rest of the team. It was chaos among the students from the very beginning, and throughout the afternoon we had crowds of 25-150, screaming their anti-christian, intolerant, unloving venom at the preachers continuously.
Most of the preachers had a chance to preach, with some even being threatened with arrest for supposedly singling out students or using “fighting words.” I am amazed at what lengths these students will go to in trying to shut down the preaching. At one point a student/youth pastor showed up and drew most of the crowd away to hear his antinomian, neo-evangelical mishmash of a message. The crowd eventually became so vile that a police Sgt. hailed the crowd with his patrol car loudspeaker and announced “No more profanity out here! I will arrest you if I hear you cussing!” Now that was a pleasant surprise.
Again, our permit ended at 3:00PM, and we all headed out for a short break until the evening service started. We attended the meeting and were challenged by some superb preaching again. After some fellowship with a small group afterwards, we headed back to our room at about 11PM.
Friday, October 17, 2008:
Today’s schedule was filled with preachers throughout the day, and I was privileged to share from Ecclesiastes 12:13-14 after lunch. The title of my message was “Who’s afraid of God anymore? I shared for about 45 minutes, and I believe that it was well received. I enjoyed the other speakers’ messages as well, which is why I try and attend these conferences every year.
We were scheduled to preach a rock concert after dinner, but cancelled due to inclement weather. Our evening ended after dinner with a few of the folks, as we were expecting a long day in Athens tomorrow.
Saturday, October 18, 2008:
We checked out of our room and met up with the team early today to make the long drive to Athens. We also dropped off our vehicle along the way to avoid going back into Marietta at the end of the day, which would also make our trip back to McDonough much shorter.
After arriving in Athens, we drove around a bit to find adequate parking, and then walked to the stadium. Evangelista and I were teamed up with Bro. Cope and Bro. Virgil, and as soon as we got to the pedestrian walkway outside of the stadium, I lifted my banner and began preaching to the huge crowds. There were tens of thousands of people here today, and within a couple of hours, they would all be inside the stadium cheering for their beloved bulldogs.
As the crowds began to thin, we positioned ourselves by the ticket gate, and we all had a turn or two preaching. Evangelista had a young man approach her weeping and bawling and howling “you’re pushing people away, you’re turning people off, please, please, STOP PREACHING!” I have never seen a man cry over the preaching. Girls, yes. But a guy, never! We eventually moved over to the open end of the stadium and faced the huge +70,000 crowd with our banners lifted high.
Our intention was to meet up for lunch, and then hit the crowds leaving the game before we headed back to the Atlanta area, but we had some logistical issues, and our team actually wound up at the wrong restaurant. Regardless, we had a superb time of fellowship, and then headed back to our truck to be dropped of by our good friend Bro. Cope.
Our drive back the RV was a bit long, and we were pretty tired by the time we arrived in McDonough. We spent some time with our very gracious hosts, and then called it a night in order to get some rest.
PLEASE PRAY FOR US AS WE PREACH THE GOSPEL PUBLICLY ON CAMPUSES AND STREETCORNERS EVERYWHERE!